


Waves Crashing, Breathing

by hueue



Series: su has me by the THROAT [1]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Post-Episode: s01e04 Volleyball, Rose/Pink it is on SIGHT, baby's got problems disorder, me watching suf: uh oh! get that boy some therapy, oh GOD suf has me by the THROAT, pink steven, symptoms? Pink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-17 22:54:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21751045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hueue/pseuds/hueue
Summary: Steven can't stop being Pink, it's all because of Her(or like mother, like child)
Series: su has me by the THROAT [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1575244
Comments: 33
Kudos: 459





	Waves Crashing, Breathing

**Author's Note:**

> ok!!! su future broke into my house and choked me to death so i wrote this because hoo BOY steven needs therapy 
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> (also it is not relevant at ALL in this fic but like. steven nonbinary. steven bi. goodnight.)

He was Pink. Again. 

He had shifted to Pink at least six times since he’d woken up just two hours ago, he didn’t mean to (he didn’t know if he _could_ do it even if he _did_ mean to) but whenever he thought about the events of the days before and whenever his thoughts drifted to Her… _poof_ , he’s Pink. Shaking his arms until the color subsided into his usual peachy skin tone, he exhaled and dragged his hands down his face. 

The sun wasn’t even up yet, two years of duties to Little Homeworld and dismantling the Empire had forced him to grow accustomed to waking up at hours he would’ve scoffed at back before he was Steven Universe, _Savior of the Universe_. Some part of him what thankful for that―he had time to just wallow in his mess without the anxiety of missing one of his many tasks, another part of him loathe it―he had nothing to distract him, just him in his dimly lit room and his thoughts. Which was his least favorite place to be. For a moment he considered calling Connie and talking around the subject until he found a viable tangent to take him as far from Her as he could but he decided against it―Connie didn’t deserve another inconvenience due to yet another of his crises. She was always so nice; just last week she'd gotten him two shiny flag pins for his jacket: one pink-purple-blue and the other yellow-white-purple-black. The least he could do to thank her was not bothering her. 

So, he leaned against his cold headboard and closed his eyes, listening to the waves crashing against the sand and breathing. 

In… 

Out… 

In… 

Out… 

… 

He had really snapped back there, hadn’t he? 

He groaned, his thoughts racing back to the incident with Pearl and Volley. It wasn’t on purpose, he’d never get like that on _purpose_ , it was just…it was just that he wanted to fix it, he had to fix it, he needed to fix it. If he fixed it, that was another problem solved. Another one of Her mistakes fixed. But even if it wasn’t on purpose, it still happened and there will always be proof of that―the fractures running across the floor and up the walls of the Reef all colliding to where he had stood.

Where he had caused it. 

Pink.

Steven waved his hands, hoping to make the color disappear but it stuck. He angrily pushed a pillow onto his face, muttering under his breath and tugging at the fabric; he did not like his new power, he decided. All his other powers were incidental and typically harmless: Floating was fun (albeit sort of annoying when Connie laughed in a particular way and suddenly he was fighting to stay on the ground), astral projection hadn’t shown itself to be a nuisance (but he could do without the accidental possession), and healing spit was a real life-saver (literally). 

This new power was different, though. He had liked it at first: Being able to beat Jasper by himself and prove that he wasn’t pitiful was a rush and saving all those people as Smokey was amazing but…he didn’t like how he felt when he was Pink. 

It was like he was his gem half, the way anger and obsession washed everything else out. He’d hit Jasper too hard, it was just supposed to be a fight to simply satisfy Jasper’s need to fight him one-on-one but he’d taken it too far. When Smokey went Pink, Amethyst had been enough to balance it out but Steven had just wanted to go, go, go until everything was perfect. He’d yelled at Volley even after she’d just disclosed that she’d been permanently damaged by Her doing the same; he usually never got angry, it was hard for him to get that way but when he was Pink it was like anger was the only thing he really _knew._ He’d scared Volley _, he scared Pearl_. 

He didn’t like being Pink. 

Honestly, through all the mess of emotions he felt at the moment, all he really wanted to do was _cry_ . He used to cry all the time, to most things, but as his responsibilities piled up and being Steven Universe began to be his job, it was almost like his body had decided that he didn’t have _time_ to cry. Sure, his eyes welled up from time to time but the last time he had been a messy, snotty, sobbing mess had been when Spinel was about to drop him to his death. Anybody would cry over that, he just wanted to cry over something less major, he just wanted to cry because he was overwhelmed and scared of himself―something he’d never been before. 

The Pink faded finally, leaving him worn out and tired. He slumped over, pulling the covers over his head; hopefully, he’d catch a couple hours of sleep before he’d have to get up and spend another day as Steven Universe. He exhaled softly, forcing his eyes shut. Waves crashing, breathing. 

In… 

Out… 

In… 

His door creaked open, his breath caught. His floor creaked under decisive footfalls from whoever had entered, Steven didn’t dare move. Two more sets of footsteps followed, one heavy and the other gentle.

 _Oh, please don’t be them._ He thought, shutting his eyes tighter. _Please don’t be them!_

“Garnet, he’s asleep.” Amethyst’s voice came, “Let’s leave the kid alone.”

Then Pearl’s, “Hush, Amethyst. Don’t wake him up.” She moved to his bedside, gently stroking the small bit of his hair visible from out of the blanket, “He’s had a long day. We should just let him sleep, we can talk about it in the morning.” 

_Talk about what?_ He wondered but didn’t stir. 

Garnet clicked her tongue, “He will avoid us in the morning.”

“How d’ya know _that?”_ Amethyst retorted, Steven stifled a laugh, imagining Garnet lowering her visor to stare at Amethyst and by the resulting ‘oh, right’ he knew that he had imagined correctly. “Well…why can’t we do this later?” 

“The next time I see us all being able to talk is two weeks from now.” 

_Two weeks!?_

Why two weeks?! Oh, stars, did he have to go to Homeworld again to serve as the Diamonds little source of joy and validation? Was there going to be some emergency that’ll swallow up the rest of his time? What was it? Is he ready for it? What does he need to fix―

“I also predicted that me saying that would make Steven reveal that he’s awake.” 

Steven’s eyes snapped open to see that he was Pink all over again, he grumbled, “Okay. Fine. You got me.” shaking his hands until the color subsided, he pushed his blanket off revealing his three guardians staring at him, “I’m awake.” 

“Steven!” Pearl exclaimed, “Why are you up so late? Aren’t you tired?” 

“Couldn’t sleep…” he mumbled, fidgeting with the loose threads of his blanket. 

“What? Why?” Amethyst cocked her head to the side, “Are ya sick?” she shapeshifted her arm so she could feel his forehead, “You feel fine…” 

“I _am_ fine. I just can’t sleep, that’s it, why are you guys here anyway?” 

Garnet adjusted her visor, “I had a feeling you needed to talk right now.” she sat on his bed, “To all three of us.”

Steven tensed at the thought of talking to them at that moment, sure he would (probably, most likely…maybe) but he wanted to calm down, he wanted to compartmentalize everything until it got less major and he could let it slip out at dinner like: “Haha! I was really scared of myself and very conflicted about what to feel about Her but I’m fine now! Pass the salt!” 

“Yeah, Ste-man.” Amethyst flopped down onto his bean-bag chair, “Spill! What’s going on with you? You’ve been dodgy all night.” 

“I haven’t been _dodgy._ ” he retorted, “I’m just tired, I don’t know.” 

Pearl sat on his bed across from Garnet, effectively trapping him into the conversation, “Steven…” she placed a hand on his shoulder, “is this about earlier?”

“N-No, Pearl, it’s not.” 

She sighed, “I know you didn’t mean it, Steven, you didn’t _want_ us to be in danger like that. You can’t control it.” 

He stared at her with abject horror, she was doing for him what Volley had done for Her―make excuses; he looked away from her, “Pearl. Mo―Pin― _She_ hurt Volley really bad. So bad that she can’t be _fixed_ anymore, She really, _really_ screwed up…just like I almost did. I almost hurt _you_ the same way She hurt Volley.” 

Pearl furrowed her brow, “But you _didn’t!”_

“That doesn’t _matter!”_ he balled his fists and shoved them into his thigh to stop them from shaking, “I don’t know how to control it so I don’t know how to _not_ be dangerous to you guys.” 

“What?!” Amethyst narrowed her eyes, “You’d never be dangerous to us, Steven. You can’t even hurt someone in a _video game_ much less in real life, you’d nev―”

“I fought Jasper.” 

Amethyst quieted, a look of disbelief on her face. Garnet’s expression shifted, Pearl looked scandalized, “You _what?_ Why did you go see her!? She could’ve hurt you!”

“I just wanted to see if I could get her to go to Little Homeschool, then she started yelling at me about how I’m not her Diamond, then she told me to fight her if I wanted to prove myself…so I did. I just wanted to get her a little bit so I hit her―not even hard!―just enough so she’d be happy but she…she tried to hit me really hard so I put up a bubble.” the Crystal Gems were completely focused on his words, Steven looked down, “Jasper, she, uh, Jasper got me under her boot and started saying stuff like how I was pitiful and how I’d never beaten her by myself, y’know? I don’t know why but…it got to me and I just went Pink. Then, I didn’t really _care_ about getting her to Little Homeworld, I just wanted to beat her. And I did…” he remembered the two of them up in the air and Steven screaming for her to stop laughing before he threw her to the ground, “badly.” 

“Steven…” Pearl whispered, eyes blown wide, “did you shatter her?”

“ **_What!?_ ** _”_ Steven recoiled back, _“No!_ **_No!_ **She’s fine, not each a crack, she just had a really bad fall. I would never…she’s fine. I actually asked her if she could teach me, she made me discover a new power―for better or worse.” 

Her shoulders relaxed some. Garnet spoke, “Yes, Jasper helped you to unearth a new power, but she did it in a way that I’m…not comfortable with.” Garnet forced out, in the last two years she’d gotten more skilled at speaking her emotions, a new ability brought on by Ruby and Sapphire’s marriage. “She made you feel inferior. That’s not what a good teacher does, I know you want to discover more about you but…I don’t want you to sacrifice anything to do it.” 

Steven nodded, braiding and unbraiding the loose strings on his blanket, “...I don’t know what this power is or why I’m just figuring it out but I don’t think I _want_ to know any more if all my new powers will be like this.” 

Amethyst sighed, throwing her arms into the air “Dude!! You sounded so excited when you figured out you could do this Pink-ify thing. Why didn’t you tell me that it was sketchin’ you out?”

“I _was_ excited, Amethyst because it had only happened once. Now, I don’t even control when it happens, it’s tied to my emotions like all my stupid powers but they go haywire whenever I even _think_ about Her.” 

Amethyst looked confused, “‘ _Her’?_ You mean Rose?”

Pink.

Pearl gasped, Garnet grimaced, Amethyst sucked in a breath, “Sheesh. Oh, that’s some class-A baggage.” 

The color faded, he rolled his eyes, “Yeah, no kidding. I’ve just been calling her ‘Her’ just to avoid getting like that. I think her name is what makes me like that, at least that’s part of it. If I just avoid talking about Her, or thinking about Her, or hearing about Her―I’ll be fine.”

The Crystal Gems exchanged a glance. Amethyst leaned forward in her chair, “Dude, that’s, like, crazy unhealthy.” 

Steven shook his head, running a hand through his curly hair, “What! No, it’s not…I’m just helping myself in the future…”

“What about helping yourself _now?”_

He didn’t have an answer to that, he wasn’t very focused on ‘now’ because he was already thinking of a future where he’s got everything under control again and stories like his little outburst would be reserved as things to embarrass him with whenever Connie was around. 

“Is this why her portrait’s gone?” Pearl asked quietly, cupping her hands within each other. “You can’t even stand to see her?” 

“I just didn’t want Her _looming_ over us like that anymore. She’s not the boss of us anymore. With everything she’s done, we shouldn’t put Her above us.” 

Garnet set a hand on his shoulder, firm but gentle, “Your mother made some mistakes, yes, but…she worked to rectify them, up until the day she had you.”

 _“Then why am I still fixing them!?”_ he spat, Pink bubbling on his cheeks, the cup on his bedside fractured. Garnet’s hand left his shoulder in surprise, Amethyst looked concerned, Pearl covered her mouth. He took a deep breath and forced it down, shame replaced the anger. He pulled his knees to his chest and set his chin between them, “Sorry.” 

The four of them sat in silence, Pearl laid a hand on his cheek, “Where’s the painting now?” 

Steven leaned away from the touch, _“Lion...”_

“What did you say?”

“Lion.” he said louder, “I put it in Lion.” 

_“Lion?”_ his guardians chorused. 

At his name, his pet was roused from his sleep, padding from his bed in the corner of the room to Steven’s bedside. Pearl’s eyes widened, “You put it in the _lion?!_ Why?”

“I don’t know. It was…the only place I could think of where I wouldn’t _have_ to think about it. If I just put it there, the problem was solved…If I just put Her in Lion…” the connection was made, the realization set in, “Oh, my god.” he placed a shocked hand (as Pink as can be) on his mouth, “Bismuth. I’m doing the same thing She did to Bismuth.” 

“Steven, wait―”

“Oh, god, I’ve just been doing exactly what She did! I’m just avoiding everything, I’m just running away!” his bedside table started to rattle, “People keep saying I’m just like her and they’re right! They’re all right!” the fracture in the glass grew more, “I almost hurt Volleyball _again_ , I ruined Amethyst’s idea because _I_ wanted to be in control, and I put Her in Lion so I wouldn’t have to _think_ about her!” the Gems stared at him, bewildered, “I keep trying to avoid Her mistakes, but it’s no use! I’m too much like _ROSE!_ ” 

The cup shattered, reducing into fine particles of glass. His body shook violently, still holding onto so much rage but far too tired to do anything other than burn it. He furrowed his brows―why wasn’t he _crying!?_ He buried his face in his hands, taking rapid, short breaths that only fanned the flame inside him. He fought to keep his raw voice level, “Leave me alone. Please.” 

To his surprise, he felt a cool hand on his hot skin. He flinched at the sudden touch, “We’re not leaving you like this.” Garnet said, her voice soft; she brought Steven’s head to rest on her chest, just like she used to do when he had nightmares as a kid. The familiarity of it calmed him down a little, just enough that he stopped shaking. “Not ever.”

Pearl laid her body against his, wrapping him up in a hug, “A Gem’s programming is…hard to break free from. It’s ingrained into our very being, but that doesn’t mean we can’t change. Diamonds are supposed to be absolute leaders, they’re supposed to be stoic, detached, and focused only on the goal with no thought about who they might hurt.” she tilted his flushed face to meet her, “I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound like my Steven Universe to me.” 

“You don’t know that…” he murmured; Amethyst blew a raspberry, crawling onto the bed, 

“C’mon! We know better than any other Gem who Steven Universe is. You went to go see Jasper because you _care_ , you took over the exchange program because you wanted everybody to try something new because you _care_ , you tried to fix Volleyball’s face because you knew your mom did something wrong and you wanted to help because you _care._ That’s trademark Steven Universe, baby!” she sat beside him, ruffling his hair, “You going all Pink isn’t changing that.” 

“But―”

“You are Rose’s child.” Garnet spoke, “You carry a piece of her wherever you go, not even just your Gem but her legacy, her kindness, her anger. Rose was a complicated person, _Pink_ somehow even more so; she let her emotions get the best of her at some points and other times she buried them deep―she was never one way forever. She didn’t let us,” she looked to Pearl, “ _most_ of us, know what she was thinking, if she was hurting, if she truly regretted her past actions, we’ll never know. But Steven, if I know one thing:” she removed her visor, all three of her eyes lovingly looking to him, “it’s that if she could see you today―she’d know she made the right choice.” 

The Pink faded, Steven pulled the Gems close, “I love you guys.” 

“And we love you.” 

After a moment he spoke again, “Garnet?”

“Hm.” 

“Were you serious? When you said we wouldn’t be all together like this for two weeks?” 

“No.”

Something lifted off his shoulders, it was small but it was gone. His vision blurred and (finally) hot, messy tears began to spill from his eyes with no signs of stopping. Amethyst flicked a few off her leg, “Whoa, man, you okay?”

He relaxed into the hug, tears dripping. Waves rolling, breathing. 

In… 

Out… 

In… 

Out… 

“Yeah. I’m okay.”

**Author's Note:**

> the finale of this show will be LETHAL to me, deadASS
> 
> but deadass Pink Steven is so interesting to me and i cant wait to see what they do with it!! also steven acting more and more like pink diamond got me: https://www.reddit.com/r/UnexpectedSCP/comments/auue53/scp457_has_breached_containment/
> 
> also i super wanna do a su high school au so if you guys wanna see one lemme know!  
> \-------  
> fun fact: writing su fanfic is v weird when your mother's name is rose


End file.
